You’ve Got Messages: How to Send Mass Texts to Promote Your Business

Many business owners and marketers are on the fence about SMS messaging. They see it as intrusive or they may annoy people.

That couldn’t be further from the truth. The vast majority of people have cell phones. They tend to look at and respond to text messages more than emails.

How can you take advantage of the potential power of SMS marketing for your business? Keep reading to find out.

What Do the Numbers Say About Mass Text Messages?

Are you one of the business owners on the fence about text messaging? You want to be sure that this is worth the time and investment before making a commitment. Here’s what the statistics have to say about mass text messaging for businesses.

Not only that, 32% of people respond to offers made via text. If you pair email marketing with text messages, your email open rates increase by 20%.

Compare that to just email marketing. With email marketing, a 20% open rate is considered to be good.

You can tell by these numbers that it may be time to incorporate mass text messaging into your marketing mix.

How to Send Mass Texts

There are a couple of ways to send mass text messages. The first option is to send text messages by putting all of the numbers into a single text message and sending it out.

That’s not going to work for a couple of reasons. One is the time that it takes to do that. The second is that all of those phone numbers become visible. It’s like sending a mass email and using the cc: field instead of the bcc: field.

That will cause your customers and potential customers not to trust you. That’s the last thing that you want is to have them be annoyed at you because you exposed their information.

There is a better way to send mass text messages. There are SMS providers that you can use to send those

Your customers’ data is safe, and you can automate a lot of the messaging. You still have to set everything up, but once you do, you can save time and generate revenue for your business.

Integrate Mass Text Messages Into Marketing

Before you send your first text message, you have to figure out what you want from text messaging. In other words, how is it going to make you money?

Like other marketing tactics and tools, you need to have a plan and a strategy for your text messaging campaigns.

You also want to have a plan as to how you can integrate SMS marketing with other marketing channels. For example, if your business is active on Instagram, you can use your account as a way to get more customers.

You can have a contest or giveaway over your Instagram account that encourages people to sign up to get exclusive text messages with discounts and deals.

The last thing you want to do is repeat the same content over different channels. People are on different channels for different reasons. They’re on Facebook and Instagram to see what is going on or to look at pretty pictures.

There’s more opportunity to tell a story that’s related to your brand on these channels.

Meanwhile, text messaging is great for quick, simple messages. You want to be able to get your point across and do so quickly.

The next step will be to set goals with your messaging campaigns. You’ll want to track things like open rates, click through rates, and conversions.

How to Choose a Text Messaging Service

Your success with sending mass texts will largely depend on the mass text messaging service you choose. There are the key things you’ll want to look for when deciding on a service.

Intuitive Dashboard

The first thing you want to look at is whether or not the service is easy to use. If it requires a degree in computer programming, you’re going to get intimidated.

Price

Some companies may or may require a contract while others don’t. You’ll want to look at things like minimum usage requirements and the fees involved if you don’t meet those requirements.

There may be charges for inbound texts and exceeding data limits. You need to get a clear idea from the provider what those charges are so you’re not taken by surprise.

Reliability

How reliable is the network the provider uses? Does it take hours for messages to be sent or are they immediate?

You won’t learn this right from providers, so you’ll need to research reviews about the companies.

Integrations

Some SMS services have a lot of options to integrate with software and cloud providers. If there are preferred software providers that you use, you want to be sure that they can easily integrate with the mass text service that you use.

Reporting

You want to make sure that your provider provides reporting tools that allow you to get reports that will help you reach your goals.

Start Sending Mass Texts for Your Business

Marketing changes fast. How people will respond to different marketing messages also evolves with technology.

The latest way people respond to marketing messages is through mass texts. Much like emails had a high open rate early on, they no longer do.

That’s why it’s important to strike while the iron is hot. You can’t afford to wait to send mass texts to your customers.